Osprey Odyssey Incredible Animal Journeys

I'm about to embark on a mission which may turn out to be an impossible challenge.

To keep up with individual migrating animals

as they fight their way over some of the most hostile environments on the planet.

Will the animals make it? Many don't.

And can I keep up with the Earth's most extraordinary natural athletes?

This is just the start of an incredible journey

that's likely to take me the entire length of the United States,

and way beyond.

I've absolutely no idea where we're going to end up.

Whooaaa!

HE WHOOPS WITH EXHILARATION

And if it's anything like this, it's going to be a fantastic ride!

In this Incredible Journey, I'm going to try to keep up with animals

that can travel over 300 miles a day, on their annual migration.

I'll be entirely at their whim.

Wherever they go, I will try to follow, guided by the latest satellite-tracking technology.

At this moment, I have no idea how this adventure is going to turn out.

Truly, in the next 60 minutes, anything may happen.

And look, Mother.

I was wearing a parachute!

And here is the plan.

We're going to try and follow one of the world's most enigmatic birds of prey.

It's beautiful, it's acrobatic, it's deadly, it's the osprey.

Ospreys are not only masters of the air...

..but of the sea as well.

Every year they take part in an extraordinary migration

of around 6,000 miles between the perfect nesting sites in the north,

and the best fishing - way, way south.

Our journey begins north of New York, in Martha's Vineyard.

65 pairs of ospreys breed on this little island.

And they're all about to leave.

Osprey biologist Rob Bierregaard has been studying their migration for the last five years.

He attaches little solar-powered transmitters to wild ospreys.

Via satellites, they beam the birds' location back to him,

so he can see where they are anywhere on the planet.

He might look tame, but this is a totally wild osprey.

This year, for the first time, he's putting tracking devices on three youngsters

about to embark on their very first migration.

It's these three we're going to try and travel with.

They'll dictate my every move over the next three weeks.

Let's meet the intrepid travellers.

First, little Tasha, eight weeks old and the youngest of the three.

She's still almost totally dependent on her parents.

She hasn't even tried to fly yet.

If she doesn't learn to fly and fish for herself soon, she won't have the strength to start the journey.

Next is Bunga.

He only learned to fly the day before he was tagged.

But he's showing all the signs of independence.

When he discovered his wings, there was no holding him back.

Finally, a real feisty one.

We're going to call him Jaws

because he gave Rob a good nip as he fitted the transmitter.

At 12 weeks old, he's way ahead of Tasha and Bunga.

He's already been exploring the world beyond the nest, and has started to wind up the neighbours.

The local songbirds don't like birds of prey.

Right. It looks like we've got a major problem already.

Bunga has gone missing.

So we're going to have to find Rob Bierregaard.

He's our osprey expert and has been keeping tabs on the birds all summer,

so he should have a good idea what's going on.

We haven't had a signal from Bunga in about a week or ten days, which is a bad sign.

It means either that the radio malfunctioned,

or that the bird got the radio off, which is pretty unlikely

and the worst-case scenario is the bird is dead.

'That's not great.

'We've lost one of our birds and we haven't even started.'

Remember, only about one out of ten baby ospreys makes it from leaving the nest to a year later.

-How many?

-One out of ten.

'One out of ten. So the odds are well stacked against them.'

So that means it's time to move on to Jaws.

OK, he's our next best bet then, is he?

Yeah. And he is a good bet.

It looks like he may have started to move three or four days ago.

But we can pinpoint Jaws.

-And Tasha.

-Oh, yes, and Tasha.

We have another young who is apparently a bit of a slow learner.

She's still hanging around the nest.

'Tasha might be stalling, but right across North America, thousands of young ospreys'

are getting ready to leave the safety of their nests,

and fly south for the very first time.

So why do they go?

In summer, Martha's Vineyard is the perfect place for ospreys to start life.

Plenty of nest sites and loads of fish.

But as winter approaches, temperatures plummet and the food dries up.

If they don't migrate to where there's more food, they'll starve.

When it's time to go,

the chicks' parents abandon them.

They're now entirely on their own.

As the chicks set off, they have no idea what lies ahead.

They're just following the instinct to go south.

The question is, where south?

Where are our birds going to take us?

We have no idea where these three are going.

The young have never migrated so they don't know where they're going.

The adults in some sense know where they're going,

We haven't followed them before so we don't know.

Who knows where you'll wind up? You're heading into Terra Incognita.

'So we're going to need every bit of help we can get.

'Our challenge is to follow their route as closely as we possibly can.

'This radio tracker will guide us in when we get really close to the birds.

'But for the bigger picture, satellites beam the birds' location to a website, which Rob checks daily.

'We'll be totally dependent on Rob's updates to locate our birds over the next three weeks.'

OK, wow! Tasha has moved.

Tasha, who I thought was going to be the last to go, or maybe not even go at all,

has gone and left the Vineyard, went to New York City.

-OK.

-..down into New Jersey and she's at Cape May.

-So the race is on.

-You'll keep me updated?

-I will be talking to you every day

-and giving you co-ordinates of where the birds are.

-Right.

-Get your little ground tracker out there and go.

-See if we can find them.

-Say hello.

-So we're going to have to get our skates on, then.

-Time to go!

-OK!

-Good luck!

-No worries! Excellent!

From now on, Rob is mission control.

From the end of the phone, he'll be our only connection to Jaws, Tasha and Bunga - if he turns up again.

Wherever they go, we'll try to follow - any way we can.

And so...the adventure begins.

It seems almost impossible.

These young ospreys are setting off on a journey that will take them thousands of miles south.

They'll travel maybe 300 miles a day.

Yet a few short weeks ago, they couldn't even fly!

Not all of them will make it, as this is a desperately hazardous journey.

How they do it, the dangers they face, and where they end up is what I'm going to try and find out.

Tasha flew right over the city.

So first stop, New York.

Not ospreys, but Tasha was here just yesterday.

Still no news from Bunga, though.

You are the Naked Cowboy?

# I'm the Naked Cowboy - coming to a town near you! # What do you think?

-Yeah, I think you're a Naked Cowboy.

-Yes.

-Do you know where Cape May is?

Er...Australia? Known for my looks, not my brains!

Cities aren't really my bag, baby, but New York is pretty special.

Everybody here is so diverse, and they're really, really friendly,

but they don't know much about ospreys!

MOBILE PHONE RINGS

We've got a phone call.

-'Yeah, Steve!'

-How are you doing, Rob?

-'I'm good. Well, we have some news - Tasha decided not to wait for you in Cape May.'

-Tasha's gone?

'She's already on the Chesapeake.'

Oh, my hat!

'But the good news is that if you're still in New York, Jaws is probably pretty close to you.

'He spent last night on Long Island, and my guess is

'that you and he may meet up in Cape May tonight or tomorrow morning.'

I think it's time to leave New York.

'The problem is most of the cabbies haven't heard of Cape May,

'which is, admittedly, in a different state.

'So they're not that keen.'

538 bucks?!

-Even if it's only just to New Jersey?

-Yeah.

OK, that's cool.

So, er...

..where did you want to go?

If we can just head south - we're migrating!

HORN BLOWS

Do you legally have to sound your horn every few minutes? Is that...?

Yes, that is, er... that is the law. Yes.

-That is the law? Just to lean on the horn every few minutes?

-Yes, that's right.

At least our cab driver knows where he's going - unlike Jaws, Bunga and Tasha.

They're heading off on their journey with no idea of what lies ahead.

How ospreys find their way is intriguing.

Adults can use their memory of landmarks from previous journeys to create a mental map of the route.

But Jaws, Tasha and Bunga are making this journey for the first time.

How first-timers navigate is more of a mystery.

Possibly, they use prevailing winds or the sun and the stars.

They may sense the invisible lines of magnetism that circle the Earth.

Or even smell their way south.

All in all, they're extraordinary natural navigators - no matter how they do it.

'What a contrast!

'From high rise New York to this!

'This is olde-worlde Cape May -

'and Jaws is heading this way to join the thousands of migrating birds

'who mass at the end of this peninsula.

'They wait here until wind conditions are perfect to launch them over the bay.'

Southerly winds are critical for our ospreys.

Rising thermals of warm air work like elevators, lifting the ospreys up to a mile high,

before they glide for maybe five or six miles to the next updraft.

Which can save them huge amounts of energy.

The problem for Jaws and Tasha is that they're inexperienced at finding thermals,

so they have to resort to powered flight more often than the adults.

It's energy they can ill afford.

For the youngsters, this whole mission is balanced on a knife edge.

And to prove the point, I've just got some sad news from Rob.

He's found a body.

'It's Bunga.

'He could have been hit by a vehicle. We just don't know.

'But whatever it was, now we're down to just two birds, and that's not our only problem.'

We've been going for a few days now and we're lagging seriously behind these birds.

Really our mission is to stick with them, so it's time to get a real pedal-on.

But we're facing another major problem on this journey.

A hurricane.

It's south of us at the moment, but we're on a collision course.

The weather's turned pretty nasty here too - makes me wonder how our birds are getting on.

-Hello, Rob?

-'Steve, how are you?'

-All right, how are you?

-'Great.

'Well, here's the news on our birds.'

-OK.

-'Jaws.'

-Yeah.

'I haven't had a signal from Jaws since yesterday afternoon -

-'makes me a little nervous.'

-OK.

But nothing from him?

'Not since yesterday about midday,

'but we'll keep checking and see what happens.'

Things are starting to unravel a bit.

The hurricane inland and now we've lost Jaws.

With Bunga out of the picture, we can't afford to lose another bird.

I'm realising just how tough this journey is for them.

Let's hope Tasha can pull it off.

More news from Rob today.

Seems like the hurricane isn't all bad news.

Its wind has sling-shotted Tasha three hundred miles south of us.

'Great for her - but a bit of a problem for us.

'However can we keep up with these birds?

'They're just running away from us.

'But I've been told matters are in hand.

'Help is on its way.'

HORN BLARES

It's all very brown.

It's very, very nice.

Bunk beds.

Now we can eat, drink and sleep on the road if we have to!

We are going to make up some ground now. This is just what we need.

This bus is vital if we're to keep up with our birds.

'Now we can keep going day and night.

'Look out, Tasha, here we come!'

We're really blessed with technology to be able to do this -

we've got GPS, we've got maps, we've got satellite tracking on the bus,

so we know where we are in any point in time.

We know what's coming ahead - something these birds haven't a clue about.

They left Martha's Vineyard for the first time ever.

Not with their parents - on their own.

They don't know where they're going, whether they can feed.

They must be quite tired - it's physically exhausting, probably.

30 days or so,

that'll stop, and they'll stop.

But where that'll be, we don't know, and we're in the whim of them, really, and where they end up.

SIREN BLARES

We pulled over on this fantastic bridge to do some filming.

And whenever you get a camera out at the moment, you kind of get swarms of police cars coming.

Ospreys don't have this problem.

But they do have other problems.

Take food, for instance.

Ospreys have to catch fresh fish every day to keep them going.

They're superbly equipped for the job.

Eyesight so sharp they can see a fish underwater from 30 metres up.

Split-second calculation of the target's speed, depth, size.

Talons open.

Hip joints swing the weapons forward to strike position.

But youngsters like Jaws and Tasha have never been taught to fish.

They're hunting with instinct - mastering the art only comes with practice.

Being a fast learner is a matter of life and death.

We've been on the road for two days now.

Just as I feared, the hurricane's heading straight for us.

Still no news of Jaws, so that leaves us with Tasha.

We followed her track for over 300 miles from Cape May

and finally, we're here -

Lake Mattamuskeet.

Rob's told us Tasha spent the night on this very causeway crossing the lake.

This might be our one and only chance of actually seeing her.

Since we've left,

this is the first time we've been even in the remote area with her,

she's always been ahead of us.

It's so frustrating - not a squeak out of her all day.

And it's a nightmare because she's on this lake somewhere.

Our only chance is that as the weather is so bad and it's getting dark,

that she might roost up somewhere.

Even our mobiles are useless out here.

If I can get to a phone and phone Rob,

then at least we can get a fix on her and then hopefully be there first thing in the morning.

Or find her in the dark if we have to.

'The good news that she's not going to go anywhere if you've got nasty weather like that.'

-Yeah.

-'The bad news is that, um...

'her solar panels may not be getting enough sunlight to really juice up her batteries.

-'It may be why we're not...'

-That is bad news.

If her transmitter's not getting charged up, then we've no idea how she's getting on.

Today has been really hard.

Um...the weather is against us and Tasha has just proved very elusive today.

It's just very stressful.

And it's made me think, actually,

it's made me think today -

are the birds enjoying it?

Are they finding it tough?

But they might be thinking, "This is great!

"Coming to new places like this, swooping down, grabbing fish, perching up."

They might be loving it, who knows?

'But the reality is, we've lost all three of our birds...

'..Bunga, Jaws and now Tasha.

'This is about as bad as it could get.

'But while there's even a faint glimmer of hope,

'we've got to push on.'

The hurricane continues to mash the coast south of us.

And we're heading straight for it.

What chance have our birds got in this?

We can only hope that the weather improves.

MOBILE PHONE RINGS

-Hi Rob.

-'Hey, Steve.'

-How are you doing?

-'I'm good, how are you?'

-Not too bad.

-'And I have some good news.'

-Oh, OK.

'Jaws has resurrected himself.'

-Oh, wow!

-'And he's sneaking up behind you.

'His radio is back and in good shape.'

Fantastic! Oh, that's really good news.

Jaws is actually alive!

That's great. Over the last three days, he's covered the thousand miles between Cape May and Florida.

And now he's just 20 miles from us.

This is our best chance yet to actually clap eyes on him.

Despite the weather conditions and everything else, we've just got to get out there and give it a go.

TRACKER BEEPS

That's it.

TRACKER BEEPS TWICE

That's Jaws.

He could be in any one of these trees here, just perched up.

But that's him - that is definitely him.

That's fantastic. Oh!

He's directly in there and that says, "No Trespassing,"

so we might have to get on the blower tomorrow morning

and see if we can find out who can get us access, because he's in there!

And he's so close, and it's pishing it down as well!

The rain hasn't let up.

But if we have any hope of seeing him, we've got to get back to his roost site before dawn.

He's gone.

Well, he didn't hang around!

This weather's really sad.

There's so much water about.

We've decided to sort of scan the area again, but no luck.

Not a dicky bird.

But he's alive.

We're back on track.

At last, the weather's cleared.

With it being so bad over the last week, most of the ospreys will have struggled to hunt.

But now, along with Jaws and Tasha, they'll seize the chance to grab themselves a meal.

But for many birds, catching a fish doesn't always equal eating a fish.

Hungry eyes are always watching.

And if the watcher is a heavyweight like a bald eagle,

the ospreys are in trouble.

Our young ospreys will face these dangers.

And every meal lost means less energy to complete the journey.

But for now, another update from Rob.

Tasha is back on line! The sunshine has recharged her batteries.

And she's caught up with us.

So, as we reach the end of the United States, Jaws, Tasha and us are neck-and-neck.

But we're not there yet.

In just a few days, despite appalling weather,

Jaws and Tasha have travelled an astounding 1,300 miles

and are now here in Miami, Florida.

This is just about as far south as it's possible to get in the United States.

But that's not the end of it. Oh, no, that would be far too easy.

'Jaws and Tasha have survived the hurricane,

'but now they're facing miles of open water.

'It must be a pretty scary sight, and they're likely to hang back.

'But we can't afford to wait.

'This is a good chance to get ahead of them.'

As the ospreys reach the tip of North America, their next landfall is way over the horizon.

Even adult ospreys hesitate to launch out over the sea.

But imagine it being the first time.

Just launching yourself out across open water -

absolutely no idea what's out there - driven on by irresistible instinct.

They've already coped with a lot.

But this is a serious test for our young ospreys.

It's a genuine leap into the unknown.

Will they make it?

Havana.

Only ninety miles from the States - but it seems like another world!

So many different races, creeds, colours here, and it's completely inter-mingled.

I don't think I've ever seen a place quite like it.

'I'm getting nervous.

'We are having no luck getting through to the States.

'So we haven't talked to Rob since Miami.

'It makes me realise how dependent we are on the technology linking us to our birds.

'Have they left the States?

'Are they out there somewhere?

'I just hope they're OK.'

Just got another message from Rob.

The birds are already in Cuba, and they're miles ahead of us.

Tasha's hightailed it to a lake halfway down the island.

And Jaws is skidaddling down the north coast.

We're going to have to get a move-on.

'We're chasing them again.

'We're on our way to Rob's most recent fix for Tasha on that lake.

'Let's hope she's still there.'

Ooh! There's one.

Not Tasha, though. And another.

AND another!

They're everywhere!

This place is osprey heaven.

The numbers here are staggering.

And they're really successful, this place is full of fish.

Tasha's chosen the perfect spot to re-fuel,

but so far, no sign of her.

This is why this migration makes so much sense -

for them to keep moving down.

And it just gets better and better fishing the further south they go.

It's not just ospreys that go fishing here.

But there's no competition.

In fact, the fishermen have a close relationship with the ospreys.

Do the fishermen watch the ospreys to see where the fish are?

HE SPEAKS SPANISH

If you see an osprey diving in the same place, that's where the fish are.

That's where the fish are? They help, they're good?

And are they better fishermen than him, or is he a better fisherman than them?

You can say that. You can say that the osprey never fails.

Ah, OK, that's fair enough.

When the osprey goes fishing,

it's a catch for sure.

Apart from the ominous roll of thunder in the distance,

all I can hear is the call of ospreys.

It's strange, we've been looking for them for so long and here we are absolutely surrounded by them.

All you can hear is cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep.

It's beautiful.

It's great to see so many ospreys.

But it would have been lovely if one was Tasha.

I'm finding it quite frustrating -

getting through to Rob is really difficult in the States from Cuba,

so we're being thwarted by our technology.

But the good news is the birds are doing it - they're flying, they're fishing, they're surviving,

which is, I suppose, at the end of the day, more than we could have hoped for.

And I think they're going to make it.

They've been on the move for 16 days.

And have travelled nearly 2,000 miles.

By now, young ospreys have gained a huge amount of experience.

But they haven't got it all worked out.

Even now, they can sometimes misjudge a catch.

It can be a fatal mistake.

If a weak and desperate osprey locks onto a fish that's too heavy for it,

it could drown.

She's done it to us again -

while we were searching for Tasha on the lake,

she flew further east and now is miles ahead of us.

So it's back on the road.

Jaws, in the meantime, is hot on her tail.

We're now heading to the far tip of the mountain range that runs along the edge of Cuba.

It's bang on Jaws' and Tasha's flight path -

along with thousands of other ospreys who come this way every year.

Gran Piedra!

When you travel to some of the most amazing places in the world,

just areas of natural splendour,

there's one thing you're guaranteed to see,

and it's that down here - litter.

I don't know what possesses people, just to drop their litter.

If this was you, I'm coming round to your house and I'm going to kick your ass!

'It's a fair old climb.

'But Rob said it would be good to come up here with Freddie Santana,

'who's involved in an osprey conservation project.'

Oh, awesome!

Now that is a view.

Welcome to Gran Piedra!

Now that was worth it.

Look at that!

Oh, I've just noticed there's a little brass compass here.

1952.

That's quite handy because that tells me that that way is direct east,

which is exactly where Jaws is as of last night.

So yesterday he crossed this ridge, flew down there,

and he's probably still down there, but we can't go there.

That's Guantanamo Bay,

and they don't like cameras.

So what is it about these mountains that makes it such a mecca for migrating ospreys?

This line. I mean, this mountain range is like a highway for ospreys

because here they can find up-draughts and thermals.

They can travel all the way.

all the way along the Sierra Maestra mountain ridge, which is like 200 or 300 kilometres long - for free.

They don't have to waste much energy.

So how many birds will you see during a day?

Well, our record was last year in August 27 -

we count 607 ospreys in a single day.

'607 ospreys in a single day!

'It's easy to see why this is the perfect place to study these birds.

'But what's the best way to help migrating ospreys, like Jaws and Tasha?'

The best thing to do is protect all those lakes and wetlands

that they feed on, in.

Those are the most important places for ospreys all along the route.

-So make sure those service areas are still there for them in years to come.

-Yes.

None of your researchers have seen an osprey with an antenna? A little aerial?

No, we have seen ospreys with a fish but not with an antenna.

In North America, they call it "packing a lunch".

-They come across here with fish?

-Yeah, with a fish.

-Seriously?

-Yes.

-That's amazing. All the way up here! "Packed lunch" you call it?

-Yeah.

That's great!

So where are all these ospreys, then?

Well, every day at noon, almost like clockwork, the clouds roll in -

indicators that the thermals are building.

Suddenly ospreys start appearing out of nowhere.

-A naked eye, you can see an osprey. That's an osprey.

-Oh, yes, yes.

-Over there.

Just at the lower fringe of the cloud? Yes.

Yes, that's an osprey.

Most of the time we've seen our birds they've been perching or feeding.

-But this is...

-They are on migration.

This is definitely migrating, isn't it? They're just cruising along.

-That's fantastic!

-There is another one up there.

I can see it. That's thermalling, isn't it?

-It's circling.

-Yeah, they are thermalling right now.

That's great, just coming out of the front of this cloud.

So it reached the top of that thermal and now it's just going to use all that height...

-Yeah.

-..to keep gliding.

It's amazing to think that two days ago, for Tasha,

she just came cruising along here just like this,

and even probably as late as last night Jaws did exactly the same thing.

But for us, this is the end of the line in Cuba.

Somehow they've survived, and we've managed to keep up with them.

It's been a tough journey but Jaws and Tasha have made it here, to the end of Cuba.

They've cruised down those mountains there and now they've reached the edge.

But their journey's by no means over.

Our young ospreys are about to face the biggest challenge of their little lives.

Soon they're going to be heading out over the Caribbean Sea.

That's 350 miles of open water.

Nowhere to fish, nowhere to rest.

This is it. This is where ospreys fall.

There's a real chance they might die out there.

That's it, I've lost them,

they're on their own now.

Let's hope they make it across.

But we've absolutely no idea where they'll end up.

The fledglings don't know it, but they're on the verge of 350 miles of open water.

If they haven't fuelled up enough, they'll become exhausted before they reach the other side.

Or they could be blown off-course and may never find land.

Anything could happen.

Four days after leaving Cuba,

Tasha stopped transmitting.

The good news is that Jaws finally made it to South America.

But you'll never guess where he settled down!

It's the one place we most dreaded he'd go - Colombia -

infamous for kidnappings and cocaine.

You keep your hands where the guerrillas can see them. No sudden movements.

All smiles, very calm.

Nobody gets out of the car.

-If they ask you, then we do what we're told.

-OK.

But without invitation, we do not move.

'Trust Jaws to have settled here!

'But at least he made it.'

Tasha wasn't so lucky.

She did really well to get this far, but somewhere out there,

she just dropped off the map.

But Jaws was strong enough,

and now he's here on the edge of northern Colombia.

Our mission now is to try to get to Jaws' new home

and see for ourselves what makes prime osprey real estate.

Right now, something rather strange is going on -

it's beginning to look like Jaws has parked himself

in the middle of a desert?

Amongst the dirt tracks and the cacti,

a few souls eke out a living here.

No electricity, no running water, and eight hours to the nearest shop.

But one of the families here have kindly allowed us to stay with them whilst we try and find Jaws.

It's a little bit cramped, our one room sleeps seven.

But this is mission control for the final push.

'But now it's late. First things first.

'I've offered to cook.'

That's about Gas Mark 4.

'Top entertainment for all the family!'

We've got a preparatory curry paste which says "hot" on it.

Now I've had these before and they're not particularly hot.

I'm not a big massive vindaloo person myself,

I like more of a...balti sort of level.

I'm ready for TV cheffery now, aren't I?

Mmm, that is, whoo! That's quite hot!

Time to see what our hosts think of my efforts.

OK?

LAUGHTER

Picante!

Is it picante?

Picante!

Oh-h!

Right, time to make a plan.

We know Jaws is out there somewhere, but this area's huge.

And what is it about this place that's so attractive to him?

I hardly dare say it,

wouldn't it be fantastic if we actually clapped eyes on him?

It's the last few miles of Jaws' and my epic journey -

what are we going to find?

A little chunk of osprey paradise.

Where northern Colombia meets the sea,

the desert transforms itself into a vast, rich lagoon

surrounded by greenery, teeming with fish and bird life.

But where is Jaws?

TRACKER BEEPS

BEEPS AGAIN

That's definitely him.

TRACKER BEEPS

He's in this mangrove here.

TRACKER CONTINUES TO BEEP

'Well, there's absolutely no doubt Jaws is here.

'I've never had such a strong signal.

'So at least we know he's alive and well.'

The only question is, can we get any closer?

TRACKER BEEPS

We might need a boat.

Why's he baling lots of water out of the bottom of it?

-He doesn't want us to sink now, just later.

-Oh, OK.

-Is that OK?

-Fine!

That's fine with me.

As you can see, the water here isn't deep at all,

right in the middle of the stream,

which means it's perfect for the ospreys because they can see all the way to the bottom.

This is why Jaws is here.

This lagoon is huge.

He's definitely here, but getting up close is starting to look like a bit of a mission.

This mangrove is utterly impenetrable to us.

We can get around it on the boat, but it's absolutely enormous.

So we have options of about four miles that way

or about four miles this way, and our bird is about two miles that way!

'On the one hand, it's awesome we finally tracked Jaws down.

'But on the other, it's frustrating we can't see him.

'Because we know he's here.

'If we're to have any hope of seeing him tomorrow, we're going to have to have a re-think.'

I love these hammocks.

I couldn't quite believe that we were going to be actually sleeping in hammocks.

But they're absolutely beautifully made.

Let me show you the sort of intricate sort of part of it -

all these tassel things and embroidered patterns and stuff.

DOG BARKS Dog's going mental.

But I didn't think I was going to be able to sleep in the hammocks with dogs barking,

and the cockerel goes off at about four o'clock every morning,

but I've actually been able to sleep quite well.

And it's...it's very, very cool.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

No-one fully understands how it works,

but for our ospreys, the urge to fly south suddenly weakens

and then switches off.

Adult ospreys will fly north next spring to start a new family.

But for Jaws, this is home for the next year and a half

until he matures.

Only then will he make the return journey to Martha's Vineyard to find a mate of his own.

And here's the most extraordinary thing -

based just on this first journey, Jaws now has a mental map of the entire, three-thousand-mile route.

When he eventually flies back up north,

he will follow exactly the same path,

picking up the same landmarks he saw on the way down.

Jaws will use this mental map again and again for the rest of his life.

'Jaws is moving around over an enormous area.

'It's turning out to be really difficult

'to get up close and personal.

'We've worked out he goes fishing every morning at about nine o'clock,

'so I guess we're just going to have to wait for him to come to us.

'Well, we hope.'

TRACKER BEEPS

BEEP

BEEP

Hang on, hang on!

That's him there - that's definitely him.

That is definitely, definitely Jaws.

There are no other birds in the sky there.

Diving, diving, yes! Hit the water.

That's our bird, that's our boy!

He's led us a merry, merry dance.

Right down the coast of North America, through Cuba,

across the Caribbean Sea, all the way to here -

Jaws covered 2,886 miles to claim a little bit of Colombia all for himself.

This has got to be one of the hardest journeys we'll ever have to do,

and we only have to do it once.

Jaws and all the ospreys that made it to South America

will undertake this epic journey every year

for the rest of their adult lives.

A six-thousand-mile round trip.

Jaws' tale is not over by any means.

Because, as with all the animals in Incredible Journeys,

this osprey is still writing his own story.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd.